Ward Burton would like to see every youngster get the same opportunities that he had. And the 2002 Daytona 500 winner is not talking about winning NASCAR races.

Rather Burton is concerned that many of the youth of today do not know what it is like to enjoy outdoor activities such as hunting and fishing.

His NASCAR success — five Nextel Cup wins and 356 Cup starts — gave Burton the resources and the voice to try to do something about it. In 1996, he founded the nonprofit Ward Burton Wildlife Foundation, an organization aimed at providing outdoors opportunities to the future hunters and fishermen.

Burton, who made an appearance last week at the Eastern Sports and Outdoor Show in Harrisburg, is working through the school system in his native Virginia, something that may take more work to accomplish in Pennsylvania, where most school districts have done away with the Pennsylvania Game Commission’s hunter education programs.

Recalling a recent outing with a seventh grade class from a Virginia middle school, Burton said, “You would not believe the percentage of kids who had never been fishing, or never had seen a beaver swamp or didn’t recognize a raccoon track on a bank, just simple common things.”

He said he is concerned about the loss of the rural culture which, he said, is responsible for today’s young people having what he called “nature deficit disorder.”

He said, “They don’t understand the things that we take for granted because of the way that we were brought up.”

Burton said schools should be teaching children about their environment right along with world history.

“My children know, but there are other kids that are not being influenced that way and it’s really scary when you think about it,” he said. “Who is going to carry on the tradition for us down the road. We have to keep up the fight and it’s got to be done through the school system.”

Burton said organizations like his are doing all they can but they are never going to reach the masses without going into the school system.

Pennsylvania Game Commission spokesman Jerry Feaser said the reason the hunter education courses disappeared from the schools was that the schools, first in urban areas and then throughout the state, either forced the agency’s hand by requiring them to sign waivers guarding them from lawsuits or by banning weapons from school grounds.

“It was an unintended consequence,” Feaser said.

In Virginia, Burton said, the programs are being run by volunteers, of which he is one. “There are a whole hell of a lot of us out there who care about our natural resources and our environment and who care about the next generation,” he said.

The South Boston, Va., native said he had great role models as a youngster, primarily his grandfather and father, and he has passed those traditions onto his own children.

Burton says that although he loves all kinds of outdoor activities and is an avid trapper, he gets more enjoyment from the thrill of others, especially his children.